The Sky Pilot is an 1899 novel by the Rev. Dr. Charles William Gordon, writing under the pen name Ralph Connor.
It is the story of a young minister whose vocation takes him to a frontier town where he is initially dismissed by secular townsfolk as “The Sky Pilot”.
Although intended to be insulting and used in that sense in the title of this book, Sky Pilot was (and still is) widely used by armed forces personnel as an affectionate nickname for a chaplain or padre.
Arthur Linfoot read The Sky Pilot on 7 July 1915, while on holiday in St. Andrews.